Final Harry Potter Book Breaks Record With Initial Sales

Harry Potter has cast a spell on readers throughout the world, who purchased millions copies of the boy wizard's final adventure, an industry data service said Monday.

Nielsen BookScan said the figures for "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" were provisional; full and final figures were due to be released Tuesday.

The company said 2.6 million copies of "Deathly Hallows" were sold in Britain in the 24 hours after it went on sale at 12:01 a.m. EDT Saturday. The figure breaks the previous record of just over 2 million copies held by the previous Potter volume, "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince." It includes sales from book stores, supermarkets, other retailers and Internet sites, but excludes sales to libraries, schools and institutions.

"Deathly Hallows," the seventh and final volume of J.K. Rowling's all-conquering fantasy series, sold 8.3 million copies in its first 24 hours on sale in the United States, according to publisher Scholastic Inc.